Public libraries in TX, LA, and MS are no longer protected by the First Amendment.

Six months ago, Anthony Aycock wrote a piece for this website called “How a Single Court Case Could Determine the Future of Book Banning in America” in which he detailed a case working its way through the American judicial system: Little v. Llano County. Aycock’s piece (and his subsequent appearance on The Lit Hub Podcast with lead plaintiff Leila Green Little) detailed the history of the case but the basic facts are these: in 2021, a group of residents in Llano County, Texas, began to challenge books in their public library system—books like Maurice Sendak’s In the Night Kitchen and the sex-ed book It’s Perfectly Normal. After seventeen books were removed, several other residents sued on First Amendment grounds, arguing that these books were being banned for content and thus represented a restriction of the freedom of expression. The case expanded and was then brought to the Fifth Circuit, which at first ruled with the plaintiffs, but shortly thereafter that ruling was vacated and a new judgement brought down that ruled against the plaintiffs. It was then brought to the Supreme Court.

Today, the Supreme Court denied the writ of certiorari in the case, meaning that they will not hear arguments in the case and the lower court’s ruling will stand.

As lead plaintiff Leila Green Little put it via email: “They will not hear our case. No explanation is given. This means that the en banc ruling of the Fifth Circuit Court of Appeals will remain in effect for Texas, Louisiana, and Mississippi. This means that public library patrons have no First Amendment rights to access information. This means we now live in a censorship state.”

In case the weight of that doesn’t hit you hard enough: this fucking sucks. There’s not really any other way to put it. I have no comforting words, nor do I feel that it is a time to mince whatever others I have available. This is fascism 101 and it is happening with our elected government’s stamp of approval. Worse, this is almost certainly only the beginning. Libraries and their patrons across the country have been battling tirelessly against challenges and bans like these and those fights will continue—but without a doubt, things are about to get much worse. It is almost a guarantee that we will see a new slew of challenges and bans popping up across the country and not just in “red states” or “conservative communities” but everywhere.

Now is a good time to support the organizations fighting against these kinds of bans (Authors Against Book Bans and PEN are great places to start) but make no mistake: no matter how well-organized and coherent a fight we might make, there is very little that can ultimately be done against the kind of institutional power that has been brought to bear by a judicial system (SCOTUS but the lower courts as well) that cannot be held responsible by any structures in American life. Maybe the answer is packing the courts, maybe the answer is dismantling them altogether, maybe it’s running your own library system to share books with those who need them. But this government cannot, will not, and does not want to protect you or your god-given rights. A pox on all of their houses, and may none of the people responsible for this know peace ever again.